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World without end : Spain, Philip II, and the first global empire / Hugh Thomas.

by Thomas, Hugh, 1931-

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Random House, 2015, c2014.

Philip II, King of Spain, 1527-1598.

America -- Discovery and exploration -- Spanish.

Spain -- Colonies -- America -- History -- 16th century.

Spain -- Colonies -- Asia -- History -- 16th century.

9780812998115 (hc)

xviii, 463 p., [14] p. of plates : ill. (plates col.), maps, geneal. tables ; 25 cm.

Originally published: London, England : Allen Lane, 2014.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 339-376) and index.

Prologue : A journey to Paris -- BOOK ONE: OLD SPAIN. -- King Philip II the enlightened despot -- King Philip the bureaucrat monarch -- King Philip and his empire -- An imperial theocracy -- The Jesuit challenge -- BOOK TWO: SPAIN IMPERIAL. -- Trouble in Mexico -- The sons of the conquistadors ask too much -- New Spain in peace -- Viceroy Toledo at work in Peru -- Convents and blessed ones -- Chile and its conquerors -- The conquest of Yucatan -- Conclusion in Yucatan -- A great conquistador from Asturias -- Franciscans in Yucatan -- The Rivers Plate and Paraguay -- The mad adventure of Lope de Aguirre -- Guiana and El Dorado -- BOOK THREE: THE IMPERIAL BACKCLOTH. -- Portugal joins Spain -- The money behind the conquests -- Piracy and buccaneering -- The galleon, a very narrow prison -- Populations discovered -- BOOK FOUR: THE EAST IN FEE. -- The conquest of the Philippine Islands -- Manila -- The temptation of China -- The conquest of China -- Epilogue : the age of administration.

"World Without End is the climax of Hugh Thomas's great history of the Spanish Empire in the Americas. It describes the conquest of Paraguay and the River Plate, of the Yucatan in Mexico, the only partial conquest of Chile, and battles with the French over Florida, and then, in the 1580s, the extraordinary projection of Spanish power across the Pacific to conquer the Philippines. It also describes how the Spanish ran the greatest empire the world had seen since Rome -- as well as conquistadores, the book is peopled with viceroys, judges, nobles, bishops, inquisitors and administrators of many different kinds, often in conflict with one another, seeking to organize the native populations into towns, and to build cathedrals, hospitals and universities. Behind them -- sometimes ahead of them -- came the religious orders, the Franciscans, Dominicans, Augustinians, and finally the Jesuits, builders of convents and monasteries, many of them of astonishing beauty, and reminders of the pervasiveness of religion and the self-confidence of the age. Towering above them all, though moving rarely from his palace outside Madrid, is the figure of King Philip II, whom a contemporary called 'the arbiter of the world.' This is a supreme historical epic, full of valor and imagination, ambition and influence, ruthlessness and humanity"--From publisher.

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